Applied Structured Systems Analysis

Practical Guidelines

Segment Outline:

• Determine if the system is data oriented or process oriented
• Is the proposed system or business requirements to be met highly data dependent? If YES
• Prepare a Statement of Purpose
• Concentrate on the Entity Relationship Model and the Data Dictionary
• Build State Transition Diagrams for the 1 to 4 most important entities
• Explanation of how to use and reconcile the State Transition Diagrams to determine process or an External Event List
• Create multi-level DFD Process Models
• Generate a proposal for a detailed analysis of the system
• If NO, the system is not highly data dependent
• Prepare a Statement of Purpose
• Generate External Event List of candidate external events to which the system must respond
• Create individual Data Flow Diagrams for each process responding to each external event
• Create DFD Process Model with 2 -3 balanced levels resulting from the External Event List
• Prepare additional Entity Relationship diagrams
• Prepare additional State diagrams to validate DFD processes
• Generate a proposal for a detailed analysis of the system
• Additional guidelines are discussed and addressed based on the system being process or data driven.